San Dimas : An Excellent Enough Debut

Although Sunday’s debut of “Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventures” proved to be one of the week’s least-watched television shows, the Fox Broadcasting series about the time-traveling duo from San Dimas High proved popular with the young adult audience it targets.

“Bill & Ted” drew a 4.1 rating, placing it 89th among the 96 shows broadcast from June 22 through Sunday, according to figures released Tuesday by the A.C. Nielsen Co. With each rating point being equivalent to 921,000 households, it meant about 3.7 million households were tuned in. A rating is the percentage of all sets tuned to a program.

But “Bill & Ted” was second in its time period (after “60 Minutes” on CBS) among adults 18 to 49, fitting with Fox’s plans to broadcast series that appeal to viewers on the younger half of the ratings scale.

Locally, “Bill & Ted” had a 4.9 rating on KTTV Channel 11, placing it third in its 7-7:30 p.m. time slot, behind “60 Minutes” and the U.S. Olympic track and field trials on NBC, but ahead of ABC’s “Life Goes On.” Each local rating point is equivalent to 48,751 households, so about 238,000 households were tuned to “Bill & Ted.”